Avon, Conn. — Trust makes for good business partners. Just don't bank on it.
In what can be considered a cautionary tale, a show producer here claims a company that exhibited at one of his shows in February stiffed him on the booth fee in a ruse that involved stop-payment of an international check.
In fact, the incident marks the second time in three years that the same Canadian concern exhibited at the Original Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Business and Entertainment Expo (GLBT Expo) and stopped payment on its check, according to Steven Wesler, president of RDP Group, which owns and operates the show.
"I was burned twice and feel foolish," said Wesler, who added that he was speaking out to prevent other show organizers from "falling prey to such unscrupulous business ethics."
In his defense, Wesler said RDP Group failed to realize it was the same Canadian concern because it signed up for exhibit space under different names — Dolphin Promotions for this year's GLBT Expo and National Canadian Service for the 2002 show. Wesler said the company offers discounted promotional trips as a way to gather the names and contact information of the show's targeted demographic group.
Both GLBT Expo shows were held at the Jacob Javits Convention Center in New York City. A consumer show, GLBT Expo typically draws approximately 400 exhibitors and 20,000 attendees, according to Wesler.
He said the exhibit fees owed RDP Group totaled $2,200 for a 10-by-10 booth at this year's show and $1,000 for a smaller booth at the 2002 show — not enough money to warrant pursuing payment across international borders.
"They know that for $2,200 nobody is going to try to collect," Wesler said. "Even if you win, you have to go to Canada to collect. To go after them would be throwing good money after bad."
Exhibitors rarely stop payment on checks to RDP Group — once every two or three years, according to Wesler. When they do (in the other cases the exhibitors were U.S.-based companies), Wesler said he sues them in small-claims court and wins.
RDP Group also produces the International Bar Show and services about 1,000 exhibitors total between its two shows, according to Wesler, whose career in the exhibition industry spans three decades..
Stop Payment
Dolphin Promotions ordered its booth on Feb. 14 and paid for the booth in full with a check dated Feb. 18 and drawn on a Toronto-based bank, TD Canada Trust, according to Wesler. RDP Group deposited the check on Feb. 23, he said.
On March 3, four days after the show closed, the check was returned to RDP Group's bank, Bank of America, with "stop payment" stamped on it, according to Wesler.
That's when Wesler and his staff remembered that a Canadian exhibitor also had stopped payment on a check in 2002.
Looking back at their records, Wesler's staff realized that Dolphin Promotions and the company in the 2002 incident, National Canadian Service, shared the same telephone number and address in Pickering, Ontario, near Toronto.
Wesler said he and his staff repeatedly called Dolphin to complain about the stop-payment check. A receptionist transferred them to the voice message of, according to Wesler, the person at Dolphin who originally ordered the booth, Sarah Demarco, as well as company president Steven McEnroe. Nobody at Dolphin returned RDP's phone calls, he said.
Wesler provided MeetingNews copies of what appear to be a contract between RDP Group and Dolphin Promotions, stating the booth size and fee; an exhibit questionnaire sent to RDP Group from Dolphin; a letter from Dolphin to RDP Group describing the company's business; and the stop-payment check, with 1315903 Ontario Inc. identified as the payer.
MeetingNews calls on March 28 to both the toll-free and Ontario telephone numbers that Wesler supplied apparently reached the same office in Pickering. The same receptionist answered the phone with the identification, "corporate." She explained that she answers phone calls through the main switchboard for several companies at the location, including both Dolphin Promotions and National Canadian Service.
A man who answered the phone for National Canadian Service identified himself as George Salama and at first said he is the company controller but later added that he is the sales manager. He said that National Canadian Service and Dolphin Promotions are separate companies.
"We are competitors," he said.
However, he also said that National Canadian Service's Ontario corporate identification number is 1315903, the same number as the payer identified on the March 3 stop-payment check.
Salama also said National Canadian Service's president is Steven McEnroe but declined to answer any questions specific to the RDP Group and GLBT Expo except in writing. He failed to respond to written questions by press time.
A call minutes later to Dolphin Promotions was answered by a woman who identified herself as Sarah Demarco, who Wessler said had ordered the booth for February's GLBT Expo. Though Salama had said the two companies are competitors, Demarco identified Steven McEnroe as Dolphin's president. She supplied a direct telephone number for him, but she declined to answer any questions specific to RDP Group and the GLBT Expo.
Instead, Demarco referred questions to her supervisor, whom she identified as George Sitel. She transferred the phone call, and apparently the man who earlier identified himself as George Salama answered the phone. He agreed he had just supplied MeetingNews an email address by which to send inquiries about RDP Group but refused to answer further questions.
He also gave a fax number by which to send written questions. It was the same fax number that appears on copies of what Wesler portrayed as the Dolphin letter to RDP and the Dolphin questionnaire. (The Dolphin Promotions name appears on both document copies.)
Unanswered Calls
Telephone calls directly to McEnroe were answered by a recorded voice message, identifying McEnroe as a recipient. Messages left by MeetingNews at the McEnroe phone number were unanswered as of press time.
Steven Hacker, president of the International Association for Exhibition Management, characterized exhibitors who fail to pay for their booths as "felonious thieves."
"Any time you aggregate large groups of people, there are going to be bad operators," Hacker said.
IAEM itself has fallen victim to rogue exhibitors. A company from Cameroon signed up for $14,000 worth of exhibit space at IAEM's 2002 annual convention in Orlando, but never showed up, according to Hacker.
The company, which had charged exhibit space on a MasterCard, won its subsequent challenge to the charge. As a result, MasterCard rescinded the payment to IAEM, and the association simply wrote off the loss as a cost of doing business rather than contest the decision, Hacker said.
For all practical purposes, show producers can do little to remedy their financial loss at the hands of international exhibitors, according to Hacker.
He suggested that show organizers file complaints with the U.S. consular offices near where the offending exhibitor's business offices are located. He said a number of complaints indicating a pattern of unlawful activity could prompt U.S. border officials to deny those exhibitors entry into the country.
"Consular officials exist to help prevent deadbeats from crossing international borders," Hacker said.
For his part, Wesler acknowledged that he can easily defend against bad and stop-payment checks simply by requiring that checks clear prior to show time or that exhibitors who sign up within a few days of the show pay with a bank or cashier's check.
However, Wesler said he would rather risk the occasional loss from a stopped check than risk losing potential exhibitors inconvenienced by more stringent payment policies.
"You take people's word," said Wesler. "You don't think people are going to write a check and then stop payment on it."